Another Accident

Motorcyclists' Tragic End

It was supposed to be a Sunday cruise along BDC road so I can ease my mind off work. When I saw a flurry of activities and Police Cars I knew it was not a good sign. I initially thought that it was the day to day Police Road Blocks. However when people ran across the road as if there was something interesting I quickly parked my car and joined them.

Police officers guiding traffic - what's going on here?

So there must have been an accident - this stretch of road at BDC has seen a lot of it lately. There's a sudden bend after the Everise Traffic light on the road going towards the BDC Roundabout.

Google Map which I grabbed to show the location of the accident


Four Police Cars showed up with an ambulance

So I went over to the drain and noticed a motorbike with its smashed headlights. 'This can't be good' I said to myself. But the crowd was not looking at the motorbike. So I pushed through the crowd and noticed......

The smashed motorcycle and a helmet in the drain

There I was with the large crowd looking at a body in the drain. First instant I asked myself if the person was still alive but he does not seem to be breathing. So all of us in the crowd just peered from above and wondered how the accident happened. Seeing that there were two helmets I believed that there would have been two victims. The face of the person was covered by his shirt. Someone went in the drain to cover it I was told. The other person on the motorbike was rushed to the hospital by the 991 Team.

So the next thing that would go in anyone's mind is how could a fall into the drain kill someone. I do not want to find out after I saw the crack on one of the drain's concrete beam. The way its cracked i would want to believe that the motorcycle could have hit it but looking at the bike's position I believe it could not have been the bike. I just did not want to speculate anything at that point.


There's a crack on the beam - real bad



Near the drain I saw a plastic full of veggies which I believed belonged to the victims. I tried to get more details on what has happened but everyone there had their stories so I just gathered as much relevant information I can gather.

The plastic full of veggies

They must have been on their way back to their work place since they were carrying their bags full of clothes and veggies.

The medical personnel getting the details


According to the temporary identification, the person's name was named Numan Anak Jagan from Kampung Ensebang Quarry in Serian. He was 33 years old.

The Police trying to contact the relatives - bags belonging to the victims
The Police tried their best to contact the relatives by going through the handphone numbers found at the scene of the accident. Since there were two victims and both were dead, it was hard to find out who was who. So the only option was to contact the numbers on the phone.

991 Personnels went in the drain to retrieve the body


911 Personnels securing the body to be lifted to the waiting ambulance

At that point I just wondered about those advertisements about preventing accidents. Could this have been prevented but I did not have much information to go about. Two lives gone - just at the blink of an eye. Probably they did not have time to find out that it would be their last ride. My experience as a motorcyclist would say that they may have not been familiar with that bend at the road which sometimes can be decieving after the traffic light. Going about 70 - 90 km per hours and knowing they would crash - and being the one at the steering I would have opted crashing into the drain as it would be a safe option rather than hitting the trees - but those beams along the drain can also kill if you hit it head on.

That Phonecall

I managed to get on record - the effort made by the Police to find the relatives of the victims. This is the phonecall that everyone dreads to recive but the officer was tactful enough to inform them that it would be better to go to the Hospital.

The phone call you would not want to get - Life is as such.
*This blog post has been edited whereby the 2 closeup image of the dead motorcyclist has been removed as requested by one of the my readers. As indicated that some children may be reading this blog. Thus the less 'scary' photo of the body & videoclip will be maintained. Thank you (10 Aug 2007).

Comments

Anonymous said…
Kasihhh mattttt...mesti iya pulai meli sayur :( kasih maiiiii
Uchu Keling said…
I read it on the paper. But, this report is much better since we can actually visualise the scene better than when we read it on paper.

Congrats!
dellyne said…
Ish...
Kesian mati dalam parit besar..

rest in Peace!
Hanna Rosdi said…
Hek2..
Xda nama nama,hehe..
Terok oso d accident huh.
Goin back soon.. Wee..!!
kadoodle said…
Nadai Nama Nama is one of my "connections" to my homeland. I love the comments, admire the spirit of Desmond to keep it up to date, and very grateful of this informative blog. I am not quite in agreement with Desmond publishing photos of dead person(s) on this web as those photos may not be suitable for certain group of people (especially the young ones). May be Desmond should revise his policy on what issues to post. And, out of respect to the deceased and his (her) family; if you could, please take those photos off-line. Many thanks.
Thanks all... :) I got kadoodle's comments noted and I got emails supporting the pictures be used for road safety awareness. I used to be a member of Sarawak Road Safety Council under the Ministry of Infrastructure Development and there are pictures much more terrible than this I can share but I choose not to. In the Council we tried (and still trying) to educate young ones about the dangers of road accidents with less gory photos but choose to share the ones that do not have blood and dismembered bodies. Our national television awareness clips show much more gory details (with blood).

At this point its my way of inculcating awareness about road safety. I have scary thoughts of keeping dead people's photos in hardisk & server even. However if the distinct picture of the 'victim' is still a problem I will remove the two major ones but I cannot act on 'anonymous comments' as kadoddle's profile shows he/she just registered with blogger. Please intro urself to me so that we can discuss on this :) I am open to comments. To make Malaysian roads more safe try to support http://www.panducermat.org.my/mly/
kadoodle said…
Thanks Desmond for your thoughtful response. I believed, and still believe, that your blog is an all-age-level-blog where the contents are suitable for everyone regardless of age level (my less-than-a-year old son can enjoy "reading" informative comments or simply enjoy looking at the beautiful Kumang Gawai).

But, (with all due respect) posting photos a person died from a vehicular accident had raise your blog rating to at least a PG13, may be higher. We'll discuss this further if you will.

I support road safety 110% and I value you effort to get the message across. In the area where I live, I used the roads in two different ways: I drive my car on them as well as ride my bike on them (though I do not ride like Lance Armstrong on Tour de France, with the help of local Bike Club, I ride a total of about 100 miles per week). Riding bike on those roads gives me different perspective on road safety. Adhering to the road safety rules and reguation does not seem to be sufficient; road condition and various others should also be observed.

My question is: Would the accident be avoided, or would the injury be a lot less, if the drain was a covered drain?

I would prefer to remain anonymous for the time being, though I do not think that we are "totally anonymous" to each other. We literally crossed path before. Some time in 1999, you were a guest in my engagement celebration.
Borneoguy.com said…
Quote:
My question is: Would the accident be avoided, or would the injury be a lot less, if the drain was a covered drain?

Answer: Nope. If the drains were covered, the covers would be gone. Why? Drain cover theft, thats why!
I was personally involved in an accident myself, trying to dodge an open man hole cover. 8%^%#$$#476 thiefs!!!